The Flying Dutchman: A History - Mythillogical Podcast

On our second ever solo episode, Charles takes a deep dive into the briny seas of the 18th century, to track the origins of the phantom ship of legend. Over the course of a hundred years of voyaging we'll watch the slow development of the Dutchman from merely an unfortunate vessel doomed by storms and plague, to an ill omen for all who encounter her.

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#flyingdutchman #pirates #history

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

Sources for this episode include:

'Manifestations of the Flying Dutchman' - Agnes Andeweg of Maastricht University

'In Search of the Dutch Lore of the Land: Old and New Legends throughout the Netherlands’ by Theo Meder

‘Don’t Shoot the Albatross’ by Jonathan Eyers

'A voyage to Botany Bay' attributed to George Barrington

'Travels in various parts of Europe, Asia and Africa, during a series of thirty years and upwards' by John MacDonald

'Scenes of Infancy' by John Leyden

‘Written on Passing Dead-Man’s Island’ by Thomas Moore

'Rokeby' by Walter Scott

'Vanderdecken’s Message Home' in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine (author likely John Howison)

'The Storm Ship' and 'The Adventure of the Black Fisherman' by Washington Irving

'Aus den Memoiren des Herrn von Schnabelewopski' by Heinreich Heine

‘The Wild Hunter, The Wandering Jew and the Flying Dutchman’ by J. Drew Stephen

‘The Flying Dutchman, the Wandering Jew, and Wagner's Anti-Semitism’ by Stephen McClatchie

‘The Legend of the Wandering Jew’ by George K. Anderson

‘The Phantom Ship’ by Frederick Marryat

'History of the British Colonies, vol. 4' by Martin R. Montgomery

‘The Cruise of Her Majesty's Ship "Bacchante" 1879-1882.’ by John N. Dalton

'Round About Rambles in Lands of Fancy and Fact' by Frank R. Stockton

[TheHistocrat]

This video is also available in podcast form, you can find it on all good podcasting platforms, including:

[RangerGucci]

You're telling me a Dutch man flew this boat?

[AshLover__]

finally, a video covering Spongebob lore

[gabbyn]

There is another german adaptation of the story, besides the famous opera composed by Richard Wagner. I assume you have never heard of it, as I cannot find an english counterpart of this story in the Wikipedia.

A german tale collector named Wilhelm Hauff took the story of the Flying Durchman and inserted it into his romantic novel 'Die Karawane' (the caravan) as 'Die Geschichjte vom Geisterschiff (the story of the ghost ship), turning it into an oriental (as the Europeans imagined it) tale. The premise is that the members of a travelling company are taking turns in telling stories, and one of them reports that he once was on a ship that encountered the 'ghost ship' in a horrible storm, which made his own sink. He and a companion get saved by the same ghost ship as it returns and passes by so close that they can get hold of it and climb aboard.

The sight they encounter is ghastly, all the crew has slain each other, and the captain is leaned against the tallest mast and fastened to it with a large nail driven through his forehead. The two survivors try to move the dead men around, but are unable to do so, as if the latter were statues or frozen in time. When the evening comes, they are set asleep, and barely note the commotion around them. The companion is worried about the events, and so they decide to remain awake and fight the need of sleep by reciting religious verses.

It turns out, the crew re-enacts the last hours of their lives every night, with a mutiny breaking out, and everyone getting killed in its course. Also, the ship is bound to return to its location where the events had happened, using its sails for the voyage. The two survivors want to reach land, so they set sail on daytime, and bind verses to the sails to keep them closed over night. This works, they reach India, and ask for a wise man to help them and the crew. The fallen sailors are taken from the ship by sawing off the planks they are lying on, and as soon as they are on land, they decay to dust.

The last one that remains is the captain who cannot be removed from the mast. The wise man takes some soil from the land, says a prayer and sprinkles it on the captain. The sailor awakens and tells his story how fifty years ago he had been the leader of a infamous group of pirates which collected all kinds of wealth. One day they captured a dervish, and as he didn't yield riches, threw him into the sea. The holy man cursed them for this deed that they should neither live nor be dead until they reach land. From then on they were forced to repeat what they had done each day without being able to change it, and even trying to send the ship against a cliff would not work. He thanks the sailor who had brought his ship to a coast and leaves all his riches to his saviour, then he dies and turns to ash like his crewmates.

[pinchevulpes]

Been mystified with the Dutchman ever since he dropped squidward into that warhammer 40k chaos dimension 😂 ☠️

[Elendil]

I am that is. My sword shall wield for me.

Redwall was absolutely excellent

[mycocal]

Just in time for me for bed. Have been listening to this show every day for weeks while I do my skincare and unwind. End up watching each video 5-6 times to cover everything hahaha

[andrex]

Recently got diagnosed with a hiatal hernia. Really makes things difficult, especially when it comes to work. All the sympathy in the world to you 🙏 i hope you continue to feel healthy, and take all the time you need

[TheDukeOfDallas]

Dude... you just blew my mind and took me back in time, bringing up Castaways Of The Flying Dutchman by Brian Jacques.. Wow, it's funny how so many youngsters grew up reading the Redwall series of books but I never really hear people talking about them. There was also a Redwall Cartoon that aired on PBS, our public broadcasting station, that i quite enjoyed watching as well. Jacques was such a talented author, rest in peace to that absolute legend. <3

[davashorb]

Sorry to hear about your hiatal hernia. I finally got mine repaired after 20 years. I understand your suffering. Feel better

[mikesummers-smith]

"Oh Senta, you've broken your vow!
I cannot believe it - just how
Could you flout Daland's wish?
Go and swim with the fish!
I'm a Dutchman if I'll wed you now!"

Richard Vanderwecken is a character, in character as a space captain, in Julian May's novel _The Many-Coloured Land_

[royzlatanestevez]

I keep being amazed at the breadth of vocabulary and depth of sentence structures of writers from the 16th, 17th, 18th century. Compared to modern novelists, it's almost as if you were reading the works of another species that only rudimentarily uses their language. To be sure, there are genius writers even now, but back then, even culturally inconsequential, now forgotten, writers, whose main line of work would be shipwright or doctor or surveyor, on the side, could be a verbal creative genius.

[geoffhunter]

I bought in a secondhand bookshop in Windsor that was closing down in the 1960's 3 vintage books one of which was "The True Legend of the Flying Dutchman" translated from the German by it the author states "Now Van der Dekker upon seeing his lovely wife being bound to the Stake for the crime of Heresy he being unable to rescue her prayed to God to intervene and save her and when the fire was lit consuming his Bride he Van der Dekker cursed God for ignoring his plea's thus the Legend was begun this i recollect took place in GOA India in the later 17th C.This book disappeared over 40yrs ago now but there was no published date but i remember it was published in Cheapside, London.

[kylefresca]

Happy to be here. Thanks for all the content.

[thoughtsofelizabeth]

I really enjoy these. My cat recognizes the music at the beginning of each episode and knows it's getting close to bed time.

I use them to help me settle down at night. I put them on to sleep to. Before anyone accuses me of being rude by sleeping to them, i hsve 2 thoughts for you. The first is that i deal with terrible, terrible nightmares. Charles and crofty have very soothing voices and the information in each episode is fascinating. If i wake up from a flashback in nightmare form, the information is intersting enough to draw me out of my terror while their voices are soothing enough to lull me back to sleep. It's gotten to the point that just hearing their voices is enough to soothe me.

The second is a bit more succinct: the chanel gets the watch-time whether or not i'm sleeping to them.

It's a win-win. I get restful sleep while charles and crofty get adcents!

(Adcents? Adsense? Not sure of spelling).

[Fortress]

This is amazing thank you perfect timing

[tem_vremenem_v_kanade]

Here to leave a like because I saw this in my notifications. Will watch later!

[siobhanomalley]

Ooooh yes, just what I needed to help me rest up after being injured in a savage squirrel attack 😅 a soothing new Mythillogical video! Also, sorry to hear about your HH, my mum has that and it's really not fun, glad you're feeling better ❤ please take things easy and look after your good self 🙂

[gideonmorton]

I cannot tell you how much I love when this channel posts.

[shamorunner]

You've always made phenomenal content Don't even following you the past year or two, fairly recently overall. Take good care of yourself, you Folks have made phenomenal content and have a great record behind you on this plenty of sources your own thoughts of interpret interpretations, and your attempts to continually include as many different angles and potential avenues when things could have been to really help people out see what's going on. Apologies if I rambling, but I wanted you to know that you very good or making a big impact on a lot of people with the work that you do for this. Take good care of yourself and keep it up

o7